Augmented reality is a view of a physical world where some elements of physical reality are augmented by computer generated inputs such as sound, graphics and so on. Users are able to use hand-held and wearable devices to retrieve additional information related to a captured image of a real world object from a camera connected to the device (for example, a camera phone or a camera attached to a head-mounted display or augmented reality glasses) and augment the additional information to the real world object. Such a real-world object may be a natural image in a document, a piece of textual information, a physical object such as a printer and so on.
In addition to hand-held devices, projectors are also being used to show augmented reality information, particularly in office environments. For example, projectors in conjunction with a camera are being used to provide an augmented reality system. A projection based augmented reality system provides hands-free and glasses-free augmented reality to the end-user.
When projection-based augmented reality systems are used to project information in environments such as an office employee's desk, suitable areas for projection may be difficult to find, or even unavailable. Such occurs because a typical desk in an office environment presents a cluttered background for projection with a variety of objects such as cups, printed documents, a keyboard, a mouse and the like. Hence, information may often need to be projected on busy backgrounds such as a printed text document or textured surfaces. In such instances, a challenge for the projection based augmented reality system is to ensure legibility of projected information. Such is particularly challenging if the projected information is textual content to be projected over or against a wide variety of complex background textures. This challenge occurs as the projected information cannot be completely opaque, and projection can only illuminate surfaces rather than hide the surfaces. Such is often particularly apparent when the projected information is textual in nature and is being projected on a surface that already contains texture. In such an event, the texture of the surface can be a distraction to the end-user. The texture may reduce the extent to which the projected text stands out, thus failing to provide a fulfilling experience to the user.
A need exists for a method of projecting textual information on a textured surface, such as a printed surface which already has printed text, such that legibility of the projected text is maintained while mitigating the distracting effects of the printed background text.